A mapping service based in Southampton has attempted to break a world record by creating the largest real-world place to ever exist in Minecraft.

To celebrate the release of A Minecraft Movie, Ordnance Survey (OS) has rebuilt the south coast city as part of an in-game recreation of Britain.

OS used its own detailed mapping data to construct an incredibly detailed representation of Britain, including all its surrounding islands.

From local neighbourhood streets to remote national parks, it features motorways and roads, vegetation, meadows, dense ferns, forests, woodlands, lakes, rivers, sand beaches, railways and islands.

Players can fly down and walk across the Itchen Bridge, travel down a traffic-free M27 or explore Southampton Common complete with its water features.

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Areas are broken down into Minecraft worlds which were developed and processed at the OS headquarters in Southampton.

The Minecraft worlds use over 100 billion blocks, which means that at the rate of a block per second, it would take a single player 28,000 years to complete the project.

Due to the sheer size of the project, OS is releasing areas in instalments, and Hampshire is one of 15 that has become playable as of today.

Players can use the in-built game mapping features to create their own maps or find areas they want to build upon.

The Itchen Bridge has been recreated in the Minecraft world which is available from today.The Itchen Bridge has been recreated in the Minecraft world which is available from today. (Image: Ordnance Survey) This new Minecraft world was developed by OS graduate and Minecraft enthusiast Jonathan Allsup.

Jonathan said: “For this project, we strived to push our open data to the limits which is why it looks so realistic.

“Plus, the educational aspect to it is strong. Kids relate to this game. It’s still popular now and is a great way to communicate the idea of location data and geography.

"Playing and building on a Minecraft map of Britain is much more engaging than looking at PowerPoint presentations in a classroom.”

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This is the second time OS has built a recreation of Britain in Minecraft.

Gamers can explore the New Forest in the OS Minecraft world of Hampshire.Gamers can explore the New Forest in the OS Minecraft world of Hampshire. (Image: Ordnance Survey) Back in 2014, it made the Guinness Book of Records for the largest real-world place in Minecraft containing 83 billion blocks that covered 86,500 square miles of landscape.

It was downloaded hundreds of thousands of times by Minecraft fans, but the original version is dwarfed by the latest one.

The new version is powered by OS VectorMap Local data and uses block sizes that are 15 metres squared, compared to the 25 metre squared blocks from 11 years ago.